


when you leave old london town, you're only camping out

by halfmoonsevenstars



Category: The Sandman (Comics), Wonder Woman (2017)
Genre: Crossover, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-10
Updated: 2017-07-10
Packaged: 2018-11-30 04:56:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11456439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfmoonsevenstars/pseuds/halfmoonsevenstars
Summary: Steve goes from one demi-goddess to another.





	when you leave old london town, you're only camping out

He aims the revolver, squeezes his eyes shut, and pulls the trigger.

What’s most surprising about it is that Steve hears the first few milliseconds of the explosion. He’d have assumed that there wouldn’t be time for it before he died, that it would be more instantaneous than this.

His last thought before he sees and hears no more is that he hopes he’d flown high enough so Diana wouldn’t see this.

Except that he _does_ hear something.

More specifically, a voice practically in his left ear, saying, “Your eyes are going to get stuck like that, just like your mom always said they would.”

Almost against his better judgment, Steve opens his eyes—and finds himself in Victoria Station, with a small woman at his side. She’s the kind of pale that makes him think of driftwood and salt, her blue-black hair pinned up underneath a black wide-brimmed hat that matches the rest of her ensemble.

“See, isn’t that better?” The hat has a positively _enormous_ ostrich feather fixed to it that bobs as she talks.

And the big silver looped cross around her neck doesn’t really go with any of it, but maybe that’s the point. Etta would know, Steve thinks. “Uh. Yeah. So—“

“You want to know why we’re here,” she interrupts, but sweetly. “Everyone always does.”

“Well, I figured out already that I’m dead, but why here? Why not somewhere back home? Or in Belgium?”.

“The war might be over, but that doesn’t mean my work is any less done.” And as if to prove her point, she neatly sidesteps a young soldier on a gurney with bandages around his eyes and missing his left leg. “You may not all be going to the same places, but at least you won’t be going there alone, you know?”

Not really. Although now that Steve looks around, he realizes that there are a _lot_ of soldiers here, and not nearly as many civilians as he’d seen last time he was coming through. “Sure.”

She laughs. “It’s okay, Steve. I’ve just been spending a lot of time with my sister lately. She must have rubbed off on me a little.”

It’s strange to be dead, because Steve isn’t even a little bit shocked. He doesn’t really feel a lot of anything, really. “There’s more of you?”

“Sort of. But, hey, look, it’s time for you to be moving on,” she says, and it’s still sweet, but urgent now. “Trust me, what I said really is true. You’re not going to be alone, but first you have to take that step.”

“Where am I going?”

“That’s up to you.”

Steve takes a deep breath and exhales it slowly before he answers. “Okay. What do I need to do?”

The woman points with the tip of the black lace parasol she’s been carrying toward the Chatham side exit. “Take your pick of any one of those doors, and good luck, Steve.”

“Thanks.” Steve squares his shoulders as he makes his approach to the first one he sees, weaving his way through men on crutches and in wheelchairs, a few Red Cross nurses wandering among them, and for the first time since he died feels relief when his hand touches the doorknob.

“Be seeing you,” she calls after Steve, cheerfully waving him on.

Steve twists the knob and pushes the door open.

And on November 11, 1918, all is quiet.

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from a popular WWI-era song, "Good-Bye London Town" (http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk/ww1-songs/good-bye-london-town.htm).


End file.
